WIMBLEDON
Date: 2006-07-08

WIMBLEDON

July 8, 2006

Roger Federer
WIMBLEDON, ENGLAND
The Moderator Roger Federer.

Question There's a lot on the table tomorrow, obviously. What's foremost in your mind as far as what's at stake tomorrow?
Answer Uhm, a Wimbledon title, one more for me. Looking forward that I've created myself another opportunity to win here in Wimbledon.
You know, never really reached a finals of any Grand Slam as easy as this Wimbledon, so I hope I can finish it off in style.

Question Why has it been so easy then?
Answer Why? I guess I played very well, that's one thing. I was always pretty much in control of my matches from the start on.
No, I think I took this tournament extremely serious from the beginning on. I had no choice with the draw and everything. So I'm very pleased that I came through so convincingly.

Question Nadal's record against yours is very good. Does he get in your face? This mighty muscles bit, does he intimidate you?
Answer No. I see 10% of what he does, I turn around so quickly. So it's an advantage for me because I don't get to see all the things. I mean, I don't think he acts bad or anything. He just pumps himself up. That's legal, no?
And, no, I mean, we've had some good matches in the past - him winning obviously more than me. It's gonna be an interesting match on grass obviously tomorrow.

Question When you're the No. 1 player in the world does it irk or annoy you that you have one player that has such a dominant record against you?
Answer I wish it was different, but again, when I came on tour, I also had bad records against some players. Over the last few years, I've been actually almost putting all the negative records into positive ones. Now I have one that happens to be negative again, and it's against the No. 2 player in the world. I'd rather have that than against the number 50th player in the world. It's kind of better this way.

Question Does the way he slows the game down make it difficult for you? He takes a long time between points.
Answer I mean, it's not because of that I lose, I don't think.

Question Does it make him difficult to play against, though?
Answer No.

Question What aspect of your game, your consistency, your creativity, your power, gives you the most pleasure yourself?
Answer You have to repeat yourself, I'm sorry.

Question Which aspect of your game, your consistency, creativity, or your power gives you the most pleasure?
Answer Uhm, I enjoy, obviously, the all-around style, you know. Once come to the net, once stay back, once serve well, once move well, once play good defensive shot. I like, you know, obviously the change. I like everything. That includes part of everything you just said.

Question Throughout the world history of tennis there's been some great battles between extraordinary players like Borg, McEnroe, Lendl, Edberg, Becker, so on. It seems like you and Rafael Nadal will be the next couple that are there. What do you say about it? Do you think about it?
Answer Absolutely, we've been more or less one year now, we met in tournaments playing each other on a few big occasions, you know. Yeah, we won so many titles last year and again this year. Didn't look very good this year for him early on with the injury, obviously. So I was happy really to see him coming back, you know, because it's always disappointing when you have one of your main rivals sitting on the sideline watching you from home with an injury.
I saw how it felt during in October, November, when I tore my ligament, you know, watching him win Madrid and watch Berdych win Paris and watching especially somebody else winning Basel. It's not great fun if you think maybe you could be there yourself and competing for the title.
No, I mean, I definitely think we've been, you know, playing for the No. 1 spot for the last year. Before, it was me and Lleyton or me and Andy, me and Marat, maybe me and Andre also at one stage. I'm happy I went through all those different players. This time around it's Rafa and it's great we play back to back in Grand Slam finals. I think it's very exciting for the sport.

Question With his record against you, do you go into this match as confident as you do other matches? Obviously, he's got the upper hand on you when you played seven times.
Answer It's obviously different going into a match like this when you know it's on Centre Court in Wimbledon. That changes obviously very much. It's different than going into, you know, the French Open final, because there it's on clay, it's his favorite surface. This is my favorite surface. That obviously changes a little bit.
But, uhm, obviously, I mean, I don't have many bad records against players, so this is one. Maybe you enter the match a little differently, I don't know. But I don't think I have been affected by him beating me because I know it's been very close all the time. When I played him, I didn't feel like I played bad, you know. I think that, for me, is very important to know heading into a final.

Question You're so experienced on Centre Court in this kind of a final condition, do you think that will give you the upper hand, the pressure aspect?
Answer Don't know. I think he's handled the pressure extremely well over the years even though he's been -- you know, he's very young. He defended his French Open title. That shows how strong he is.
He's never been in the Wimbledon final, and I don't know how much it really means to him, you know, if it means more than the French Open. I don't know. But I've been in this position, and maybe I can draw some experience out of it.

Question When you first began playing on grass, do you remember what was the most difficult aspect of the surface or your game to make work well?
Answer Well, you know, you have bad bounces on clay and you have bad bounces on grass, but it's a different type of bad bounce because you have more time on the clay still to adjust, where on grass you sort of shoot through, you know. I think that's what you have to adapt to.
And then I think most importantly is the footwork because you got to go from -- we come always from clay, you know, you slide and hit, and here you do little steps and you hit. That is constantly. I think that's the biggest change you have to do for grass.

Question Has there been a time in this fortnight where you thought someone's given you a good game? On paper, it looks easy for you.
Answer I actually thought, you know, a few guys played pretty good against me, you know. I was just really playing very well, you know, didn't allow them to actually be, you know, leading the score.
I mean, Bjorkman told me yesterday he felt all right. Ancic, I thought he played pretty good, you know. Mahut, I thought he served incredibly well. I had some players I thought played pretty good against me.

Question Which one was most difficult?
Answer Until now? Well, I think -- I don't know. I mean, I was worried before many matches this year. I guess the most difficult one might have been Ancic, looking back, I think.

Question You said yesterday you went out with Peter Lundgren, your former coach, and said, Be gentle with me. Dare we say you actually had a drink or two, your clean-living image?
Answer Well, you never went out or...?

Question You said, Be gentle with me, in your quotes yesterday. You went out and played a game.
Answer I told Peter, yeah.

Question You said you didn't get in until, what, four o'clock in the morning?
Answer I didn't say when I came home. I said I came home late and I had to wake up early.

Question Which aspect of him, Nadal game on grass, surprise you the most? Is the serve, is the movement he has now compared to last year?
Answer Uhm, you know, I mean at the beginning of the tournament I said who were my favorites, you know, next to me. Was Roddick and Hewitt, I thought. I said that very clearly, and because Nadal hasn't had the opportunity to prove himself yet.
But Nadal has been playing very well on hard court. Some people forget that, especially the media, I think. They totally underestimated him here. He's won Madrid, which is fast. He won Dubai, which is fast. He beat me there. For me, it's not a surprise to see him here in the final. He's been able to adapt to different surfaces pretty well over the last year. He's obviously going to improve, he's still very young.
For this reason, you know, I'm not surprised with any, his movement or his returning or his serving, I knew he could do all that.

Question He didn't lose any serve the last four matches.
Answer He didn't lose his serve? I mean, he should have been broken several times.

Question Do you think the competition in men's tennis on grass is slightly lower than it used to be in the mid '90s or do you think it's improved?
Answer Uhm, hard to say. I think back then you had many more players who, you know, maybe really believed they could win Wimbledon because their game was suited to grass much more than it is now. More people probably think they can win the US Open, Australian Open, French Open. Before, many people aimed much more for Wimbledon.

Question You said you prepared perfectly for this tournament, focus and everything else. Was that a problem that you had to sort out early on in your career with the focus and going into tournaments, the way you prepared?
Answer Yeah. When you're young, you're trying to find out what's the best solution, you know. Is it getting enough matches heading into a Slam? Is it having enough rest going into a Slam? You know, what do you need as a player?

Question The late nights before...
Answer That was the last tournament of the year. I'm talking about now Grand Slam preparations, you know.
For instance, one year I went to Rosmalen. I played the semis there, lost to Lleyton. I remember I couldn't even play the semifinals because my whole mind was on Wimbledon, you know. So after a while, I figured out that maybe for me it's best to not play the week before a Grand Slam, you know. If I do, I play only an exhibition like in Kooyong. Other than that, I really have time to prepare, you know, relax, and then be at a hundred percent when the Grand Slam tournament comes around.
That's, I think, the difficult part early on in your career which you have to make up your mind for.

Question You have a routine?
Answer Yeah, obviously.

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